Sergio Leone and the Infield Fly Rule: ROBIN WOOD AND RIO BRAVO
Dennis Cozzalio over at Sergio Leone… (you should really read that blog, as Dennis’ work is awesome) wasn’t writing about Rio Bravo or Wood but the reaction of Jeffrey Wells of Hollywood Elsewhere who wrote an entire post chastising the favorite film of a dead man. Whatever you think of Rio Bravo, this was in poor taste.
That brings up the real point of this post, Rio Bravo vs. High Noon. I like both movies for different reasons. Hawks made Rio Bravo in response to two films, High Noon and 3:10 to Yuma (1957). Hawks never made a lean or revisionist western, and had concrete ideas on what constituted a good one. He was particularly interested in the good guy, usually the town marshall or sheriff. A sheriff, if he was worth his salt, didn’t do a lot of soul searching and he wasn’t conflicted. He was a professional, knew what to do, when to do it, and didn’t let emotions get in the way of doing an effective job. Also, Hawks’ films were almost never allegorical, as far as I’m concerned. There was probably a smattering of unintentional subtext, but he wanted to tell a good story, and that’s why I think he had trouble understanding High Noon.
High Noon is Carl Foreman’s take on weak people naming names in front of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) during the red scare in the 1950′s. According to him, Stanley Kramer, Foreman’s partner at the time and producer of High Noon, wanted Foreman to waive his fifth amendment rights and tattle on people whom the HUAC had already determined were Communists. For refusing to do so, Foreman was blacklisted. When Hawks saw the picture, he publicly derided it saying that Will Kane (Gary Cooper), the sheriff in High Noon was “running around town like a chicken with his head off.” He also objected to the Grace Kelly character killing the main bad guy instead of Kane doing it himself.
I actually think Foreman and director Fred Zinnemann wanted to shake up westerns a little. Apparently, westerns were starting to decline, although some of the finest films of the genre were made right up to the beginning of the sixties, especially the films of John Ford, Hawks, Henry Hathaway, Sam Fuller and Anthony Mann. High Noon probably breathed some renewed interest in the genre until the torch was handed to television. I also think that what I call the John Ford epiphany, the fact that Ford became interested in the plight of the American Indian and started treating them in his films as actual characters and not plot devices, helped to improve the western even more.
High Noon was released in 1952 and Hawks didn’t manage to get Rio Bravo out the door of Warner Bros. until 1959. I’ll let Wikipedia give you the plot:
In the town of Rio Bravo, Dude (“Borachón”; played by Dean Martin), the town drunk, enters a saloon wanting a drink. Joe Burdette (Claude Akins), seeing Dude eying his glass, throws a silver dollar into a spittoon to mock him. Just as Dude goes for the spittoon, Presidio County, Texas, Sheriff John T. Chance (John Wayne) kicks the spittoon away, looking at Dude with pity and disgust. As Chance turns to face Joe Burdette, Dude grabs a small piece of firewood and clubs Chance on the head, knocking him unconscious. Dude then starts toward Burdette, but two of his hired cow punchers grab Dude. Burdette starts to beat Dude with the two men holding him. A bystander grabs Burdette’s arm so he can’t swing on Dude again. Burdette draws his gun and shoots the bystander in the stomach. The close-up of Joe’s revolver discharging is the first close-up in the film. Burdette then leaves the saloon and heads for another one thinking that he can do no wrong.In the second saloon, after Burdette has another drink, Sheriff Chance enters with his Winchester aimed at Burdette, to arrest him for the murder of the bystander. One of Burdette’s men then draws his Colt revolver on Chance and creates a stalemate. Dude enters behind two of Burdette’s men and then takes the revolver of the man standing in front of him and shoots the gun out of the hand of the Burdette man. Chance then whips Burdette across the face with the rifle, knocking him unconscious. Chance and Dude drag Burdette out of the saloon, headed for the jail.Joe Burdette is the brother of a powerful rancher, Nathan Burdette (John Russell). The rancher’s men then quarantine the town in preparation to breaking Burdette out of jail. The only help Chance has are his deputies Dude and Stumpy (Walter Brennan), an old cripple. Pat Wheeler (Ward Bond), a wagoneer, enters town with a wagon load of supplies from Fort Worth. Tensions are further strained by the presence of a young gunslinger hired by Wheeler to guard his wagons, Colorado Ryan (Ricky Nelson), and the arrival of a mysterious woman, Feathers (Angie Dickinson), who becomes romantically involved with Chance.
- Quarantining Joe Burdette.
- Getting Dude sober.
- Chance and Feathers’ relationship.
I put them in their order of importance, as I believe Hawk’s would have treated them. Since this is the anti-High Noon, he would naturally have relegated Chance’s love for Feathers to the back burner. There are some situations where Feathers’ tries to wedge herself into the situation over Chance’s protestations. These scenes seem sexist on Chance’s part, but are actually common sense. Feathers never actually establishes herself as gun savvy. I think Feathers is one of the most interesting female characters in a Hawks film. In many important ways, she seems to be channeling Lauren Bacall from another great Hawks film, To Have and Have Not.
Also, in the vein of doing the opposite of High Noon, Chance doesn’t accept any offers of help. He gives the reason to Ward Bond’s character, Pat Wheeler:
Supposing I got ‘em. What’d I have? Some well-meaning amatuers, most of ‘em worried about their wives and kids. Burdette has 30 or 40 men, all professionals. Only thing they’re worried about is earning their pay. No, Pat. I’d just be giving them more targets to shoot at. A lot of people’d get hurt. Joe Burdette isn’t worth it. He isn’t worth one of them that’d get killed.
Good reasons. Moments like that are what makes Rio Bravo a great western. In fact, everything in Rio Bravo is nearly perfect. The pacing seems lackadaisical but the story moves ahead briskly, each event building on the one before. The dialog, as usual in a Hawks film, is brilliant, although he doesn’t use the device of overlapping dialog, which was a signature Hawks technique. All the main characters seem to have lives outside the film, a feat most movies today can’t seem to get straight. The set piece at the end of the film, the battle at the Burdette warehouse, is very exciting and is brilliantly photographed and edited.
The drawbacks to Rio Bravo aren’t in the film itself, but what it would spawn later. John Wayne would go on, except for a few films, to play this character in some equally great westerns such as The Sons of Katie Elder and Hawks’ own remake to Rio Bravo, El Dorado. Of course, The Duke made many more mediocre westerns in this period like The Cowboys, Chisum and Hawks’ third remake of Rio Bravo, Rio Lobo.
Rio Bravo is just fun. Everyone on screen seems to be having a good time and that becomes infectious. If you have never sat down and watched a classic western I would recommend Rio Bravo as your entry into the genre. You won’t be disappointed.
Having watched both High Noon and Rio Bravo recently, I agree on the points mentioned. High Noon is a left wing version of a western. It shows a man alone against great odds vs Rio Bravo where help was actually being refused. Both films are entertaining in their own rights as they have excellent actors doing what they do best. I do not have to like their politics to like the movies. John Wayne is John Wayne, right wing tool right up there with Charlton Heston, that does not mean I will boycott their films. I am watching actors not politics.
I still need to see the remakes of Rio Bravo as well to get a better idea as to the genre. Lately I seem to be watching more westerns, not a favorite genre but I am getting more open minded in my old age.
Anyway, thanks for putting this up.